On February 19, 2015, in the parking lot of the House of Hope, three dark green Boeing MV-22 Ospreys touched down. One carried the 44th President of the United States and the nation’s first African American President, Barack Obama. His motorcade whisked him to Gwendolyn Brooks Preparatory Academy. There while I watched, President Obama declared the Pullman National Monument. With the stroke of a pen, change had once again come to Pullman.
Presidential Proclamation 9233 is the monument’s establishing legislation. In it, President Obama reaffirms Pullman’s national significance “based on its importance in social history, architecture, and urban planning.” He seamlessly weaves together the threads of the Pullman story. He recounts the rise and fall of George Pullman and his model Town of Pullman (1880-1907). He lauds its architect Solon S. Beman and its landscape architect Nathan F. Barrett. He describes the Pullman Palace Car Company’s role in industrial and labor history, including the “Pullman strike of 1894.” He reminds us how the American Railway Union led by Eugene Debs brought the nation’s railroads to a screeching halt with a boycott of Pullman cars. He tells the story of the Pullman Porters and their half-century of struggle for better wages and working conditions. In 1937, supported by the leadership of A. Philip Randolph, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters successfully secured the “first major labor agreement between a union led by African Americans” and a major corporation. This was both a milestone and fuel for the escalating civil rights movement in the United States.
"The remaining structures of the Pullman Palace Car Company (Pullman Company), workers’ housing, and community buildings that make up the Pullman Historic District are an evocative testament to the evolution of American industry, the rise of unions and the labor movement, the lasting strength of good urban design, and the remarkable journey of the Pullman porters toward the civil rights movement of the 20th century."
--President Obama, Proclamation 9233
But Proclamation 9233 does more than commemorate: it’s a binding legal document with long-lasting implications for our community. It granted “fee title” ownership of the “Administration Clock Tower Building” to the federal government (.2397 acres). It also made Pullman a new unit of the National Park System. As reported in Washington Monthly, “Kathy Schneider” is “the National Park Service superintendent for the Pullman National Monument—203 acres covering the factory site, the historic town center, and adjacent worker housing.” Additionally, in accordance with the 1906 Antiquities Act, it established a “National Monument Boundary” that is “confined to the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the objects to be protected within those boundaries.”
Proclamation 9233 also directs the National Park Service to prepare a “management plan for the monument” by February 19, 2018. The planning process has begun, but is unfinished. Today, the management of the Pullman National Monument is guided by the June 2017 Foundation Document (https://tinyurl.com/PNMFD). A more comprehensive and detailed General Management Plan (GMP) is supposed to follow. The GMP “clearly defines the desired natural and cultural resource conditions to be achieved and maintained over time.” These could include plans for the restoration of Market Hall, the Firehouse, or Barrett’s Victorian landscapes, such as that of Arcade Park. The GMP was formally started in February 2017. But since that time, updates have been scant and next steps undefined. The National Park Service webpage “Plan Process” for Pullman’s management plan reads, “The plan process for this project will be posted here.” With the three-year anniversary of the Pullman National Monument upon us, the time is ripe for the National Park Service to update the community about the status of the monument’s General Management Plan.
